Judge may set bail for Dutra

Friday

Mar 16, 2007 at 12:01 AMMar 16, 2007 at 6:45 AM

STOCKTON - A judge said Thursday she would consider a request to set bail for Sarah Dutra but first needed time to read the extensive court file of the college student convicted of helping poison and bury Woodbridge attorney Larry McNabney.

Scott Smith

STOCKTON - A judge said Thursday she would consider a request to set bail for Sarah Dutra but first needed time to read the extensive court file of the college student convicted of helping poison and bury Woodbridge attorney Larry McNabney.

Dutra, 26, made her first appearance in San Joaquin County Superior Court since the state's 3rd District Court of Appeal last year ruled that Superior Court Judge Bernard Garber didn't have the authority to order Dutra to serve the maximum of 11 years in prison.

Dutra was convicted of helping McNabney's wife, Laren Sims, feed the attorney horse tranquilizer and then bury him in a vineyard outside Linden. Sims, 36, confessed to the crime and then hanged herself in a Florida jail.

The appellate decision last year sent Dutra back to San Joaquin County for a new sentencing hearing in which a jury will hear a brief version of the trial and help a judge decide if Dutra deserves the maximum sentence or a lighter term of six or three years.

San Joaquin County Deputy Public Defender Keith Arthur, appointed to represent Dutra, asked that bail be set at $30,000. She poses no flight risk, Arthur told Superior Court Judge Cinda Fox, who will preside over Dutra's case.

Arthur argued that if the jury finds Dutra should serve a lighter sentence, she has been in prison longer than her term. Dutra's mother, sister and several other relatives attended Thursday's hearing, and Arthur said she would live with them if bail was set.

San Joaquin County Deputy District Attorney Thomas Testa opposed the request, describing Dutra as a violent felon with a long history of telling lies.

"She's been convicted of killing a guy intentionally," Testa said. "Any promises she may make to appear are worthless because her word is worthless."

Testa, who prosecuted Dutra, said she and Sims drove the dying McNabney around looking for a place to bury him. The women then stowed McNabney in a refrigerator at his home, and Dutra asked McNabney's son for a date.

Dutra's behavior was "off the charts in terms of viciousness and callousness," Testa said.

Fox said she would address the bail request at Dutra's next hearing, on March 28.